The words above begin the novel Jitterbug Perfume, a modern classic
by Tom Robbins. The beet plays an important role in the story; it ties
together the book's themes of sex, love, religion and immortality.
Like the apple, the beet is one of the few things we eat that has
it's own mystique and thus can carry these heady themes through a
novel. As Robbins was inspired to write by the ruby root vegetable,
chefs Claudio Aprile and Matthew Dillon have cooked for us their beet
inspired dishes. Turn the page and let the delicious dramas unfold.

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For Chef Claudio Aprile, cooking is more than a career. It's a
matter of life and death.

The turning point of Aprile's chef life is bracketed by a
fiery plane crash and a Fiat teetering on the edge of a precipice. He
told us about these life-changing close calls when we sat down to chat
at the bar of his restaurant, Colborne Lane, in the
anything-but-dangerous downtown of Toronto. There he recounted his
cinematic stage that began with a fireball and nearly ended with Aprile
staring down the sheer face of a cliff.

August 2, 2005

First there was the acrid smell of gasoline. Then they saw the
fire. Aprile, his wife and two-year-old son were at Toronto Pearson
International Airport watching Air France flight 358 burn. Miraculously,
all on board escaped after the Airbus skidded off the runway and burst
into flames during landing. Media dubbed the crash the "Toronto
Miracle." The plane the Aprile family watched go up in flames was
supposed to have taken them to France. Shaken but determined to get to
their destination, they put the horrific images of the day aside and
left on the first flight the next day. Once safely across the Atlantic,
they made their way to Spain's Costa Brava, to the Catalonian town
of Roses. Aprile's ultimate destination: El Bulli.

Aprile arrived at El Bulli a little the worse for wear but eager to
begin work. He had in hand a letter confirming his position in Ferran
Adria's kitchen and a few bottles of Canadian ice wine a
cross-cultural gift to make a good first impression. His wife and child
were back at the $500 per night hotel. Aprile was met by Chef de

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Cuisine Albert Raurich, who promptly informed him he had no place
in the kitchen; they were full. Aprile insisted, showing Raurich a
printout of the e-mailed appointment letter. In return, Raurich showed
him a subsequent e-mail that stated the offer had been retracted since
the kitchen was, in fact, full. Aprile had never received it.

The trip had been years in the making. Aprile first heard of a dish
called Fisherman's Bread Sorbet and a chef, Ferran Adria, in the
1990s. He had had a culinary epiphany. Aprile thought of the sorbet as a
metaphor for fearlessness in the kitchen. He realized there was much
more to cooking than he had previously imagined. His eyes were suddenly
open. To say that Aprile was disappointed to have finally arrived at
Chef Adria's kitchen only to be so flatly denied would be a serious
understatement. The refusal was soul shattering.

A sous chef saw Aprile distraught and close to tears. He intervened
on his behalf and asked Raurich to give Aprile a chance, just one day.
Raurich refused. Aprile, at a loss and as a gesture as much of
resignation as desperation, handed Raurich the ice wine he had borne
across the Atlantic. Wine in hand, Raurich turned to the devastated
Aprile and said, "Okay ... one day."

Aprile had a day to prove himself. "I worked my ass off.
Nonstop. All day." The following morning he received a call in his
hotel room. He was out the door within seconds of the conversation,
stopping only to grab his chef whites. He had been asked to complete a
stage.

El Bulli is famously situated off a perilous country road, atop a
northern elevation on the Gulf of Roses. At the end of his first
official shift, Aprile piled into the Fiat of an Italian chef along with
two others from Japan and Holland. In the blink of an eye, the driver
lost control and the car careened off a cliff. Just as suddenly, it hit
a boulder and became impacted; free fall averted. Call it the
"Roses Miracle." Once back on solid ground, the driver fell to
his knees, clasped his hands and prayed. The chefs swore they
wouldn't speak a word of their near-death experience at work the
next day or ever after a pact Aprile kept until he sat down to speak
with us.

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The lesson of this tale may be: when dedication, planning,
persistence and even heart fail, break out the ice wine! Or maybe a more
plausible response is: even when plunging into the abyss, all may not be
lost. Rather than a universal moral, however, this story illuminates the
character and cuisine of Chef Claudio Aprile.

Aprile believes "accidents can be inspiration." He enjoys
taking risks. "Creative people need fear to create," whether
that fear is of the unknown, of failure or the terror of a car wreck.
Aprile has spent his life searching the world and his soul to figure out
who he is as a chef. Perhaps that truly makes his food soul food.

He's about to take yet another daring leap, closing the doors
of the we44-estoblished Colbome Lane to start down a new path. The
restaurant garnered much acclaim due to Aprile's singular take on
the techniques of molecular gastronomy applied to the flavors of
Southeast Asia and South America. The restaurant will reopen in 2012 as
Project, Aprile, who is originally from Uruguay and has a second
restaurant in Toronto called Origins, has reached another turning point
in his career. He is abandoning his hard-earned identity as a chef to
create something entirely new. He is nervously excited and says Project
will be a center for culinary creativity and experimentation. He says it
is something he must do to move forward, to keep evolving and creating
as a chef.

Chef Claudio Aprile presents the following dishes as he closes a
chapter in his life. They symbolize another turning point Once again
Aprile is pushing limits in pursuit of a new incarnation of himself and
of culinary perfection. He focuses and drives forward, perilously close
to the edge where he's clearly most comfortable.

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